Gridlock!

look at all of the political rhetoric on here and wonder what are we thinking. Here are two simple things we should all see. Whatever our stance on spending is, the debt ceiling has to be raised to pay for what we have one way or another already spent or committed to spend. Raising the debt ceiling isn't about new spending, it is about paying for what we have already spent.

The answers to this is simple. We need to make budgets and approve them far in advance. We shouldn't be making budgets in September (October) . We should have the budget finished and the rule-making done before the fiscal year begins. We certainly shouldn't make a budget then wonder how the debt we created in the budget got there. Pay the debts we made.

How to decrease spending? That one is easy too. YES EASY! If we ask the executive departments to reduce their demands by 15% and let them actually make the cuts, they can and will live off of them. The problem is congress wants to decide where the cuts are made. They want to spend on programs that are advantageous to their districts even when the department (especially defense) has the project at a lower priority or even doesn't want it at all.

The bottom line is both sides of the aisle voted for the budget. Both sides of the aisle made it into what it is. That brings us to the second thing: Congress. They have a 5% approval rate. Why don't we throw them out? The bottom line is that a couple of things happen that keep us from it. The first is that we believe that the ones that we would replace them with wouldn't be any better than the ones we threw out. The other is that there is far more power in incumbency that anyone wants to admit. To the political parties it isn't about America, it is about the balance of the aisle. You would keep anyone as long as they were usually dependable to the cause of the largest donors and partisan media.

The whole problem is simply that NO ONE is accountable. As long as we have a permanent congress who doesn't have to come back to their district and live as one of us, it is NEVER going to improve. I have lots more where this came from. This is too important to ignore. The problem is congress from both sides of the aisle have failed and now they are all blaming someone else.

Voting

Why do you suppose the founding fathers created the Electoral College  and had the US Senators selected by the state legislatures?  The idea was you weren't supposed to vote for someone you did not know or at least were able to meet. The legislature could meet the Senate candidates and you would have sent them (in our case to Austin) with our trust as they should have been part of our greater community. Every four years you would send a qualified elector from each congressional district to the electoral college to select a President and Vice-president. In a nutshell you sent someone you knew to make a reasonable choice.

Today, vote for people we have never met, likely we don't know anyone who has ever met them in an informal setting, and trust what they or their backers (who have an agenda) choose to tell ./ not tell us!

Frankly even the electors at the electoral college (and members of the US house which basically mirrors their number) are going to be beyond our knowing them. We have to figure out how to send people who actually share our values to congress and the presidency and I don't mean those that build coalitions since we agree on a few items.

Health Insurance

Health insurance reform is a bane to everybody. Small businessmen and the self employed see it as yet another regulation by government. Businessmen who insure themselves and their employees see it as a not insignificant expense. Health insurance costs begin at around $6.00 per hour worked. In some circumstances it is as much as $15.00 per man-hour. Many employees forgo health insurance because the premium cost is often half or more of their take home pay.

Some claim the employer fails to pay more out of greed, but in most cases, he is paying about as much in wages and benefits as he can afford. The simple fact is his goods and services could become priced out of the market. It is one of the biggest reasons why we are losing manufacturing and even service sector jobs to overseas providers. They work with a lower wage and benefit cost.  We decry the use of slave like and child labor, but we continue to buy the products they produce.


The problem is that we argue for "free trade" but honestly we want it by our rules. What are our rules?  First we have a minimum wage. How do you compete with the minimum wage. I think everyone believes the minimum wage we have here is too low to live even frugally on. This is not an argument against the minimum wage, honestly I think it is too low. This said, it is way higher than the international market we are competing with.


Most wage earners who make near the minimum are uninsured or using public means such as Medicaid, CHiP, and Medicare.  When we move people off the public assistance insurance source we send them onto the public hospital route. This is unpaid care. What do I mean hospital route? It means using the ER as their primary care provider. In some cases hospitals provide this care by certifying the patient as needy. In other cases the patient is given care (some places give full care and others give only immediate necessary care) and the patient is billed and bullied for payment they cannot or will not pay for. This makes a mess of our emergency care system and is much more expensive than routine primary care.

I wish I knew how to make this happen short of large-scale government support or worse so government mandates that raise the expense he pays for labor (through insurance premium cost) with marginal if existent increases in income.

If anyone has a suggestion, it would make for great discussion even if it gets shot down by the realities of it all. I am looking for your suggestions or comments.

If I had a Billion dollars...

What is a billion dollars? It is a thousand million. The one hundred-seventy-three billion we (the US treasury) loaned the AIG group is nearly six hundred dollars for every man, woman, and child in the U.S.A. The federal debt is over $7.000 for each of us. Where does it stop. Put into perspective, the federal debt is $45000 per family of five. If that were a car at 5.0% interest the monthly payment would be $850.00 per month for 5 years put over 20 years it still be would be $300.00.If we did no more deficit spending or borrowing.

I need a job

Eight years ago someone told me to get anywhere i needed a degree. At forty-two, I went back. I finished a degree plan from my twenties. Political Science. It was the quickest way to finish (4 long semesters) while working forty hours a week. I did OK. 3.0 Wish I could have done better, but time was a killer.

In the meantime as the economy soured, the demand for degrees became more in the realm of a specific degree. I looked mid career to those hiring entry level people and lacked true management experience to those who would be considered mid-career.

Update,... I have a job. I need a special purpose......

A proposed amendment to the constitution of the United States of America

Subject: AN amendment relating to eligibility, terms, and limits for service in the Houses of Congress of the United States.

A person may serve up to 4 full terms of two years in the lower house (House of Representatives.) in his lifetime.He also may not stand for election after having served  7 years  in the house..

A person may serve up to three full terms of six years in the upper house (the Senate)
He also may not stand for election or reappointment after having served a total of fifteen years in the Senate.

For a person to be eligible for election to the Lower House he must have lived in his district for three years immediately previously and must have been present in his district either 275 days in the year previous to filing for the election or an average of three-hundred days or more over the previous three years. Current Incumbents of the US House seeking reelection are exempt from this qualification.

For election to the Upper Chamber, a person must have  must have lived and worked in his state for three years immediately previously and must have been present in his state either 275 days in the year previous to filing for the election or an average of three-hundred days or more over the previous three years. Current Incumbents of the US Senate seeking reelection are exempt from this qualification.

Upon the Decennial Census based reapportionment,an incumbent member of the House of Representatives may seek reelection to the same seat he currently occupies
 or one that either represents the incumbent's home of record from the previous term or an adjacent district that 3/8th's or more of the district's residents were in said Representative's previous district.

60 Thousand dollars

What is a family income of sixty thousand dollars a year?

$7000 in Federal income tax.
$5400 in a car note
$2500 in Car insurance
$3900 in Health insurance
$12000 in Housing
$5000 in Utilities
$2250 in fuel (18K miles)
$7800 groceries
$1800 clothing
$5200 Misc medical, dental, etc
$2400 in household insurance
$4750 for EVERYTHING ELSE

This is in TEXAS what about California or New York?